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Monday, April 25, 2011

Mendoza, wine and mountains

I arrive at Mendoza around 9 in the morning. At the bus station I get information on how the get to Puente del Inca and if there is an options to continue to Santiago from there. It’s possible. Around the station Mario is giving information about his hostel, I take the brochure and we chatted a bit.

I go to his hostel, and almost without unpacking the backpack, I meet Virginia (Chile) that she is going to bike around the wineries of Maipú. I join her without thinking.

We started visiting the Museo del Vino de la Bodega La Rural, a good introduction to various systems that have been using for years. Then we go to the winery Viña Cerno, where we join a tour of the facilities ...

The following is the winery Bodega Di Tomasso family, here we do a tour and tasting of 5 wines. It is the oldest winery in Maipú.

We are hungry. We stopped at a market to buy something for lunch because is already 15:30 ...

The last winery we visit is the Carinae, we do a tour and tasting. For my taste is the best we’ve been today.

With Virginia we have dinner and take a Fernet with coke ...

Sunday to do Sunday. I go for a walk by Mendoza. There are several squares and a giant park.

At the afternoon I meet Virginia to walk. We visit the Space Contemporary Art and we like it.

In the hostel there is an English couple who will do a tour along the valley that leads to the Chilean border crossing the Andes. I join them.

Long ride on the bus but the best way to see every corner of the valley. I dropped to sleep in Puente del Inca because there was no way to contact the hostel there, and anyway I could not move around to see the other point I want to see.
We go from 700 meters of Mendoza up to 4000 meters where there is the border with Chile. Spectacular scenery, we see perfectly the Aconcagua ...from 40 kilometers.

Back in Mendoza, rest and buy the bus ticket to Santiago de Chile for the next morning.